Proof of Concept
by Marc Vun Kannon
Summary: Henry visits Adam in the hospital, to keep him up to date on the most recent developments.
**A/N** I recently got the complete series of Forever on DVD, and watched them all in the space of about a week or so. I'd seen 7 of the first 10 episodes, and loved the whole idea behind the show. Like all shows about immortals and other ageless persons, it suffers from the problem of how to deal with aging stars who aren't supposed to show it, so I'm actually glad they ended the show when and where they did.

I would have preferred a resolution to the curse, though, so like a lot of us who write fanfictions I decided to make one, or perhaps more than one. I've read a few of them, not the whole lot, but mostly they seem to focus on Jo somehow becoming immortal, so that she lives forever with Henry. Me being me, I decided to go a different way.

As always I assume you've seen the whole series, so I will be referring to things freely. I do own Forever, but only the one DVD set.

* * *

The coat rack stood near the bed with the immobile man lying in it. Only Henry ever visited, and Henry had no strong desire to spend any more time in the paralyzed man's presence than he had to. He talked while he hung up his scarf and coat, and he spoke while he put them on again, so keeping the rack in the man's field of vision was simply the most efficient placement.

"Good evening, Adam," he said, as he always did, coolly polite. His entire relationship with Adam had been dry and passionless from the start, and Henry saw no reason to antagonize him simply because he seemed to have the upper hand now. In lives like theirs that could easily change. "I'm afraid I'll have to cut my visit short tonight, but I have reached a milestone of sorts, a number of them, and we are going out to celebrate." He stepped forward, but he never sat on these visits and didn't change that tradition now.

"You know about my decision to reveal my secret to Jo, of course. Sorry, Detective Martinez. Half of that decision was yours, after all, shooting me and leaving me to be found by her as I died. Not that she did, but she found sufficient evidence at the scene to push her suspicions past the tipping point." For a moment Henry's attention went elsewhere. "Interesting phrase, 'tipping point'." He shrugged. "You wanted to destroy my life, but we both underestimated her, something I'm all too happy to celebrate."

Henry smiled. "We are also going to celebrate my last death." He watched as Adam's eyes, which tended to wander whenever he talked about his relations with 'ephemerals', suddenly moved to fix upon him. "No, I still bear the curse. At least I think so, but there's only one to prove my mortality, and I have no desire to attempt it anymore. Certainly, if your theory had been correct, your shot would have killed me and we would not be having this conversation, one-sided as it is.

"However, that death was my last death. I have found, strangely enough, that by deciding to tell Jo, sorry, Detective Martinez, of my condition, rather than having the issue forced upon me, I have a renewed interest in my own survival, something I thought I'd left behind long ago. Perhaps it is a renewed sense of pride. Or love. Being able to take that fatal blow on someone else's behalf was a useful heroism, but a cheap one. It is harder to live, when dying is so very easy, but for her sake I am making the effort, and I have promised her that I will continue to do so, come what may."

Henry brushed his fingers over his ears, stroking the few strands of gray. "I am also taking this opportunity to conduct an experiment of my own, on you as well as me. Perhaps the only method of dying that neither of us has attempted is the simplest, time itself. I plan to use up whatever life I have in the living of it, to grow old and take my chances." Henry checked his watch, then stood and collected his coat and scarf. "It may not work, but I have nothing to lose by making the attempt, and quite a lot to gain. And that is the last of the things we are going to be celebrating tonight." He paused to wrap the scarf around his neck. It wouldn't do to catch a chill now.

"My wife has just _detected_ that she's with child, you see."

* * *

 **A/N2** I've never thought that the curse meant that Henry never aged between deaths, just that he was reset to the age he was when he died the first time. He just died a lot. Nor was it ever stated that he couldn't have children, as far as I know.

I'm also a big fan of the movie Highlander, which makes a big deal about the loneliness of being immortal. I see this show as being a 22-episode movie, with a long but pretty well-defined story arc of both Henry and Jo learning to connect with humanity again.


End file.
